A proposal to make future chiefs of police in Covington unclassified employees won unanimous support from the City Council Tuesday night. State Rep. John Schroder, R-Covington, is expected to sponsor a bill in the Legislature this spring to remove the city's police chief from the civil service system.

The move would make it easier for Covington's mayor to fire a police chief.

Mayor Mike Cooper said the change is needed to eliminate a contradiction between the city's home rule charter and the state civil service rules. The charter says all city department heads, which includes the chief of police, shall be appointed by the mayor and serve at the mayor's pleasure. But another section of the charter makes it a civil service position, which limits the mayor's authority over the chief and subjects all would-be police chiefs to civil service testing.

The move to make the police chief an unclassified post comes after Cooper's protracted effort to dismiss former Chief Richard Palmisano, who was fired in April of 2013 after allegations of officers in the department using excessive force. Palmisano initially appealed his firing to the civil service board but later decided not to challenge the dismissal.